Hi,
I have a new PC and I'm having troubles to find a proper kernel config: the kernel does not boot. But I don't know why. It only powers off the computer. There must be some options that prevent the kernel from even being loaded, but no idea of what can it be.

I have tried to run the kernel with kexec, but the kernel provided by the Gentoo installation CD does not allow me to run kexec

Any ideas?

BR_________________Computers are like air conditioners, they stop working properly if you open Windows

Last edited by majoron on Wed Nov 14, 2018 11:56 am; edited 1 time in total

genkernel does not build every module in the kernel. It has its own .config file that it uses.
I don't know if it supports NVMe yet, so NVMe users should use the --menuconfig option to check._________________Regards,

NeddySeagoon

Computer users fall into two groups:-
those that do backups
those that have never had a hard drive fail.

genkernel does not build every module in the kernel. It has its own .config file that it uses.
I don't know if it supports NVMe yet, so NVMe users should use the --menuconfig option to check.

Thank you NeddySeagoon

I am still a bit confused to decide whether to put modules into the kernel or just as loadable? What is the rule of thumb here? Can you give some recommendations? I usually borrow kernel config from binary distro like Arch and follow Gentoo Wiki to set configs for special needs like aufs, lvm over luks. Arch Linux puts most of the modules as on disk loadable just like "make allmodconfig".

Is there any tool to debug kernel loading process? Sometimes I got booting stucks and don't know why, so I just opt to release compiler optimizations like march=native to march=x86-64, making lots for trial and error, getting lost along the path.

My rules of thumb are to build everything needed to boot, into the kernel.
That way, either no initrd is required, or if you need user space tools to a assemble raid and start LVM, like I do, the initrd does not contain any kernel modules.
That means that the initrd need not be rebuilt for kernel updates. Its just like firmware.

Next everything needed after boot should be a loadable module. This isn't hard and fast.
e.g. I could make amdgpu as a module but I like an early console, so I have amdgpu and its 20 firmware files built into the kernel.

Anything you always use can be built in too, even things you load with module parameters.
Module parameters can be passed on the kernel command line. Modules are much better than built in for parameter trial and error.

Lastly, things you won't need, turn off. Good use of the menu system in the kernel config tools will save a lot of time.
When you turn off a menu, the options on that menu assume sensible default values, usually off.
The example here is if you don't have a TV Tuner, turn the menu off. Don't read all the options and turn them off one by one._________________Regards,

NeddySeagoon

Computer users fall into two groups:-
those that do backups
those that have never had a hard drive fail.

My rules of thumb are to build everything needed to boot, into the kernel.
That way, either no initrd is required, or if you need user space tools to a assemble raid and start LVM, like I do, the initrd does not contain any kernel modules.
That means that the initrd need not be rebuilt for kernel updates. Its just like firmware.

Thank you, more than a year with Gentoo and I am still on the way to maximize its customization capability which helps me a lot in learning the OS. Being scared of not booting I turn on all modules as loadable and include all + firmwares in initrd Kernel is small but initramfs is quite big up to 200MB xz compressed.

Maybe I will start soon next round of gentoo experiment starting from "make tinyconfig" and topup necessary modules into kernel and initrd.